Solstice
by DuchessOfDementia
Summary: Winter was abating, but all Gendry seemed to be able to think about was whether or not the bards would someday write songs about the princess of Winterfell and the bull-headed baseborn who loved her stubborn arse.
1. Ghosts

She hadn't been able to pose as a lad for nearly two years now.

She flowered not long after reaching three-and-ten, and from there, it became impossible to hide her swelling bust and newly flaring hips. For awhile she attempted to conceal her new shape, wearing looser and looser tunics to obscure her sex, but upon her four-and-tenth name day, she gave up. Her training among the Faceless Men gave her leave enough to change her appearance, in any case, so it didn't much matter either way. Still, she felt a bit of sadness, knowing that the last of her true tomboy days were done.

Arya had always thought herself to be an ugly girl; as a child, she had been told as much by her sister and all of her peers. She had grown up with eyes and a forehead too large, lips too thick for her baby's teeth, legs too skinny, fingers too long. Since becoming one of the Faceless, Arya nearly never wore her own face, and had no one to judge her looks. The idea of seeing her true face again found its way into her head shortly after she heard news of _Arya Stark _being released from the grip of Roose Bolton's bastard, who had been terrorising the North. Apparently the news was years old, and had come slower to Braavos than in Westeros. The discovery that she had an impostor bothered her more than it should; had this girl actually been her—or at least a decent pretender—she would have never submitted to a beater and a raper. She would open her own neck with a dirk before she did.

Hearing the name again, however—_that_ name, _her_ name—sent her spirit barrelling years backward. Back to the nine-year-old girl, thin as a boy, with her Stark coloured hair and eyes and her new adult teeth. Back to the frozen dirt and dark greens of Winterfell where that girl made her sister groan in shame when she beat her own brothers at wrestling or riding or swordplay. Her memories did not seem true anymore; they felt like stories she could spy in her mind's eye, someone _else's_ memories. She no longer felt like she had been an active participant in her own past; she felt as if she had never been more than what she was now, that the girl in those fog-edged dreams had died young and been buried long ago.

She was _no one_ now. She did not have a family, or a past, or a life coloured with all that those things entailed. And she did not miss it; at the end of that little girl-boy's life, the only colour she saw was red. Red so thick, so _dark_, it was nearly black. _Everything_ was red. Her clothes, her hands, the road before her.

No; she did not miss that, she thought. She did not miss the horrible, unspeakable pain that accompanied grief and loss and heartbreak. She did not miss the weeks without proper sleep, the lonely hours where she would run just into the beginnings of a wood, press her face to a tree without care of receiving scrapes, and scream as if she were on the end of spear. She _refused_ to cry; crying was what helpless women did instead of actually _doing_ something. Crying implied despair, and despair meant _inaction_. Screaming was _rage_; it was better to scream, she thought. So she had. She had screamed herself absolutely hoarse in that time, screamed like she was dying, screamed without care of the wild pitch of her voice and the way it cracked with emotion. She had dug her raw, chewed nails into the tree bark, then beat her fists against it until they bled.

That was back in the time when it was not so easy to escape who she was; back when she could not even spy her own reflection without feeling her heart break at the sight of her father's Stark eyes staring back at her. Back when the name 'Arya Stark' alone was enough to make people want to kill her or be her saviour.

But the news of her impostor bothered her a great deal more than it should have. She could not seem to shake the desire to see herself again, to know whether the short life of the girl-boy Arya Stark had been a dream after all. She wanted to measure how much the dead girl had grown, see if she was still there beneath the lid of her coffin.

Next time she found herself by the canals in daylight, she leant over, briefly closing her eyes and relinquishing her mask for the first time in years, and studied her distorted, gently rippling face in the water. She was breathless for a moment, wondering again if it could all be a dream, a phantasmal illusion of a life that never was.

_No_, she realised with a startling rush of spirit. Arya Stark—because that was who she was, see, she was _Arya Stark_—lifted her hand to her cheek, letting her long, spidery fingers ghost along the planes of it. Her face had a strangely sensual vulpine quality about it that it had not had when she was a child; the weight in her cheeks was gone, her face taut and mature, leaving her eyes wide and grey, her nose slender and so very _Stark_ that she had to collect herself for a minute.

'_Che Bellissima!' _Arya's head snapped at the catcall, only to meet the eyes of a young Braavosi peddler-boy who was grinning at her, his eyes twinkling. She was too stunned to return the smile.

Her identity was flooding back to her in massive, bone-crushing waves, and she was certain that if she tried to stand at that moment, she would lose her balance and fall face-first into the canals; and she never, _ever_ lost her balance.

Arya's chest was suddenly tight with an unbearable longing for home that she had not felt for many years; she knew that most of her family was dead, but she was holding out hope for Jon and Sansa, whom she had not, at the very least, heard anything about. Her mind began to spin and whir with ideas about returning to Winterfell—the rebellious, prodigal daughter come home—and reclaiming it for the Stark family. She thought of finding this Bolton bastard and carving his heart from his chest for doing what he had done to her home; she even thought that she might laugh at him as she did, mocking him for ever having thought that for even the briefest minute, he had broken _Arya Stark_.

She decided it was fate when she heard the peddler-boy who had catcalled her earlier speaking fluidly in Braavosi to an old man of an auburn-haired beauty who had claimed Winterfell as Queen of the North.

Arya was on a ship back to Westeros that same night.

It was oddly easy to leave the Faceless Men behind; it had been a refuge to her, certainly, but not a home. Try as she might, she could not completely squeeze the yearning for a family from herself; however, she had certainly steeled near everything else. She surprised herself by smiling coyly at the young men on the ship who stared at her with equal measures of blatant desire and confusion over what was probably her mannish garb. Her father had once told her she looked like Lyanna Stark—'_but she's beautiful_,' she'd replied, dumbfounded. But now, she felt the thin, pleasing hum of power buzzing about in her chest, knowing that there were men mooning after her. She wondered if this was how Sansa felt _all_ the time. Arya decided to enjoy the company of her young Essos admirers, drinking and laughing with them, learning their names and their tales. Most of them seemed content to watch her and speak to her, and the one who tried to slip into her cabin in the night was met with a sword to his throat.

She was surprised to find the face of Gendry, the boy who had abandoned her for a knighthood, floating behind her eyes as she sought sleep on the rocking ship. She wondered absently—_or_, at least, she would claim it was only so—if he was still at the Crossroads Inn with Jeyne Heddle, herding the orphan children. She wondered if he might be dead, too. She felt the terribly familiar ache of loss when she realised that if he _had_ died, she wouldn't have heard of it, because when a nameless bastard dies, next to no one mourns them.

The notion made the ache so much worse.

_xxx_

Gendry Waters had not left the inn since she disappeared.

He had accepted she was dead; it did not mean he didn't mourn for her still, however. She was his first and only true friend, and he had betrayed her. And it was because of that betrayal that she had fled, been taken by the Hound, and promptly delivered to her death at the Twins.

It tortured him.

He and Jeyne's passion had run dry long ago; in fact, he didn't like using the word 'passion' to describe the pair of them at all. 'Liking' seemed more appropriate. They were both terribly alone and lost, and found solace in one another. Moreover, the both of them had lost themselves to someone long before climbing into bed with one another. For Jeyne, it was an errant pageboy; for Gendry, it was the tiny thorn in his side that the world had used to know as Arya Stark.

When he used to lay awake at the Inn, silently asking himself what he was doing and where he was going, it had been Arya's voice that snapped back, _'What, were you just going to leave me, stupid?' _and he would answer resolutely, _No_. He would not leave her—her memory, that is—behind. She had been a girl of one-and-ten when last he'd seen her, just on the verge of womanhood. So young and so spirited. When she died, he became certain that there was no justice in the world. Surely no god would create something so special only to have it snuffed out before it could properly burn.

His days moved slowly. He often forgot things that transpired, or conversations he had. None of it mattered much, really. He kept on living because _she_ had kept him alive for so long; and he had repaid her by _killing_ her. He may as well have sunk the blade into her throat himself.

He ignored the japes of the men of the Brotherhood, the way they all painted him as a lovestruck fool for the way he patiently rejected the advances of the women who flirted with him. Many of the more crude men referred to him as 'Cunt-struck Gendry', the young man who lost himself to some pretty slut as a lad and now desired no one else.

Gendry tolerated all the japes directed towards himself, but the first time he heard Tom refer to Arya as a '_pretty slut'_, he broke the man's nose in two places. It was foolish to be so offended, given that Tom did not know the identity of the girl who had so ensnared him, but it mattered little to Gendry. Arya's memory was sacred to him; it was, after all, the only thing that remained of her.

It tortured him to know that he had forgotten the sound of her voice. She had been so close to womanhood; budding breasts, hair curling under her chin, all bright eyes and luminous skin when she bothered to wash. He recalled how she'd looked in that acorn dress, all tight and laced in just the right places, looking pretty enough to be presented to the King himself. He could not remember her exact features, but he remembered that her face had always had the kind of odd but somehow matching qualities that promised a unique future beauty. _He_ had certainly thought she was comely enough. The only thing—aside her eyes—that he could remember with sharpest clarity was the cinnamon sprinkling of freckles across the bridge of her nose and her cheeks. He had discovered their existence one day after she returned from bathing for the first time in ages. Previously, they had been indistinguishable from the dirt that caked her skin. He found himself queerly and feverishly loving the memory of her freckles, imagining that they would multiply as she grew older. She would be five-and-ten now, Gendry would think, staring into the inky blackness, spying the tiniest shreds of moonlight that peeked in from the poorly thatched roof. Five-and-ten; a woman grown, flowered and tall and feminine. Gendry nearly laughed at the idea of Arya being tall, and then he could not stop himself from sniggering at the thought of her being _feminine_; woman's body or not, Arya would never be seen in a skirt or a hairnet, Gendry thought with surety. Sometimes he would find himself dreaming of this five-and-ten Arya Stark, traipsing across the world somewhere. He dreamt of finding her—sometimes in King's Landing, sometimes in Winterfell, sometimes in some exotic place he invented in his mind—and kissing her like a man kisses a woman, like lovers kiss. He would always see her sharp grey eyes, framed by her messy dark fringe, and then he would see those lovely freckles...but nothing else. Her nose, her lips, her body, they were all absent, memories lost. She would try to speak to him, but the words were muted and faraway, impossible to hear or understand.

She was fading away, and it was killing him.

Few had ever paid him much mind; being knighted had been Gendry's first step in _becoming_ someone. He wanted to be worth others' time, to be seen as a _real_ person. Someone worthwhile and useful and _important_, rather than just another forgettable baseborn. Arya had been his friend besides that, and she was the first girl who he had ever spent real time with. Since then, he had come to know other women, but only to realise that there would be no better than her.

For a long while, Gendry had loved her the way an older brother loves his younger sister. She was bold, and terribly fun to tease besides, and nothing more than a little girl who looked like a little boy. He protected her from brigands and rapers, poked fun at her, and all the other things he imagined brothers did for sisters.

It was not until that night when she had appeared in that acorn dress that his idea of her changed.

His first instinct—one which he promptly followed—was to laugh. Here was _Arry_, his headstrong, bold, half-mad little friend, stuffed into a gown, washed, combed, and perfumed; and looking ready to murder someone. It had seemed so _absurd_ at the time, to see Arya actually dressed like a girl. She had looked so...so _not at all_ like Arya.

But then he found himself watching her. Watching her speak to Tom and Lem and that highborn arse, Edric Dayne, 'Lord of Starfall'. He noticed how..._nice_ she looked, now that he could properly see her smile and her laugh. And somewhere after he had had more ale than he should've, he'd found himself noticing her chest. When had she gotten a _chest_? But there it was, plain as day; two small, round bumps, drawn tight beneath the bodice. He found himself bristling when he wondered who else had noticed them before he had.

He abruptly realised that this was not how brothers looked at their sisters, how they thought about them. And then, so sudden and so plain, he remembered he was _not_ her brother, that he was a young man and she a young lady, small and bright and _pretty_. And somehow he had ended up in the forge with her, touching her wrist, _sniffing_ her, and then he was on the ground and tickling her and wrestling her—

Since that night, Gendry had often wondered what it would be like; a future with Arya Stark. Those many years ago, he had turned the idea around in his mind several times, thinking that mayhaps they could runaway together or her family would not mind her marrying a baseborn lad or mayhaps he could be legitimised or mayhaps he could just follow her as her servant...

Little good it did him. Now he simply lived, toiling through the hours because he needed to. Everything reminded him of her; stars and dirt spatters and cinders on the ground made him think of her freckles. He could not see any shade of darkened brown without relating it to her hair. And should he have the misfortune of stepping outside on a grey day? It was as if he were walking under a huge, cruel version of his dead Arya's eyes.

_xxx_

The voyage was not long. They arrived in the Saltpans in the evening, a heavy, creeping fog around them. Arya gave the ship's Tyroshi captain several silvers before disembarking. It was quite cold and she had no horse, though Arya figured she could remedy that soon.

The town was still only a ghost of what it used to be; even after several years of reconstruction, the damage from its sacking had not been erased. Nonetheless, Arya found an inn, stayed the night, and in the morning bought a strong-legged sorrel courser with the destination of Winterfell in mind. She'd asked around the inn about the 'Queen in the North' and been met with stories of a beautiful young auburn-haired girl who intended to restore Winterfell to its former prestige. The bitterest cold of the winter was past, and as Arya rode northwest from the Saltpans, she kept imagining seeing Sansa in the Great Hall of her family's restored castle, all donned in black and grey and navy like their mother had always worn. The thought made her chest swell with longing and affection for the sister she used to disregard and insist that she hated. It had been far too long since she'd heard Sansa's voice; she even missed her barbing comments about Arya being ugly or uncouth or unfit to be a lady. Arya smiled at the memory; _you were right, sister, _she thought. _I was never suited for the life of a lady. _

Arya rode for two days with little rest. She was so eager—it had been so long, _so long, so long_—and she could not find it in herself to pause for anything.

And then she found _the_ inn.

Arya yanked the reigns so fast that her horse nearly bucked her off its back. She found herself staring into the dimly lit windows, just _staring_, waiting for a familiar face to pass by.

_What am I doing?_ She asked herself, closing her mouth from the cold. She had to go and see Sansa; everyone she knew from the Brotherhood had probably already left or been killed long ago anyhow. It wouldn't do to go poking around at old friends who probably though she was dead anyway.

When Arya slipped from her horse and led him by the reigns to the stable, she did it with the fierce internal insistence that she only needed a good night's sleep; nothing more. In the morning, she'd be gone again. She was very good at being gone.

_xxx_

Gendry was _drunk_.

He'd scoured the inn for ale, wine, mead, anything. And he'd drank it all. Today had been one of those terribly frosty, terribly _grey_ days when nothing seemed to be exactly worth it any more.

He sat by the fire at the back of the inn's main room, sitting precariously on a wooden stool and using his weight to lean it backwards and forwards, finding a slow, drunken rhythm. Staring into the cracking, spitting tendrils of flame, the thought to just reach his hand in, just to see how it would _feel_, had passed into his mind. And he stared at his right hand, imagining it black and charred and dead; useless. He would have no place at the inn if he did that, he thought. He wouldn't be able to smith or haul or _anything_; completely good-for-nothing. Just a baseborn nobody who can't even summon a smile any more.

He heard the sharp, howling suck of wind that announced the front door was open. "_Jeyne_," he shouted hoarsely, not even turning around. "_Someone's at the damn door_!" He knotted his hands together and tucked them under his chin, refusing to rip his gaze from the hearth.

He heard Jeyne's noisy curses from upstairs, remembering that she had been bathing the orphans. He supposed the kind thing to do would be to see to the guest himself, but Gendry didn't feel like being particularly kind tonight.

He heard footsteps easing along the old rotted floorboards, and then the door slammed shut. The footsteps stopped, and the room was silent, save the fire.

Gendry was too drunk and far too tired to deal with whoever it was. Lifting his ale mug from the floor and draining the last of it before setting it down again, he waved a dismissive hand behind him. In his mind, it seemed an appropriate way to say to the 'visitor' that he didn't give a single damn about them or whatever they wanted.

"Well," a woman's cool voice said from a good many paces behind him, "you're closed then, are you? Or just rude?"

Gendry scowled into the fire. "Both, as a matter o' truth. Haul arse, girl, there's no bed for you here."

The footsteps started again, coming a bit closer before stopping for a second time. "_Don't_ call me girl. How many stags for a bed, then? I'll bet if I slap enough on the counter one will just _appear_."

Gendry bent down to retrieve a bottle of old Dornish wine. It was sour, and probably well past drinking age, but it got him just as drunk as anything else. He gulped it greedily, and his head swam. The hearth was blurring before his eyes when he set it down. "No bed," he repeated, slurring. "Geddout."

This time, the footsteps were not slow or few. They marched noisily—_ugh, far too noisily_—right up to him. He could feel the woman's presence just behind.

"This is the only inn for miles, and my horse and I as well are near death with exhaustion. I'll pay you well, just get off your arse and find me a bed, will you?" she snapped irritably.

_That tears it_, he thought, anger flaring suddenly. He jumped from his stool, letting it flip and fall over, ignoring the way the room spun before his eyes. His hands snatched at the girl's wrist—_tiny, soft_—and gripped it tight.

"Listen, now, you"—

Gendry's voice withered and died in his throat, sticking there, dry and useless. He inhaled sharply, but did not exhale. He had forgotten how.

Eyes. _Those_ eyes. _Grey _eyes. Grey and huge and slanting the tiniest bit in the corners, just like he remembered. His gaze fell just below them, where a sprinkling crop of freckles was scattered along cheeks and nose.

His brow furrowed. His mouth opened and closed like a fish dying on a beach shore. His stomach twisted with nervous, stunned sickness.

"Drunk, are you?" she said, flashing a tiny half-smile that did not reach her eyes. "I s'pose you have more of your father in you than I thought."

"Dead," he gasped, looking into the face of Arya Stark. Her eyes told him she was just as shocked as he was.

"Not exactly," she muttered back, her gaze flickering between his two eyes.

_xxx_

His dreams that night were colourful for a change.

Arya was there—Arya was _always_ there—but she was not dead or angry or missing this time. He could see _all_ of her face, as pretty and grown as he pictured it, all lips and eyes and freckles. He could hear her voice, too, all sensual and low: "_Not exactly. Dead? No, not exactly." _He did not know what she was talking about, but he found he did not care. Arya was there, and even though it was only a dream, it kept him happy for a little while.

A slap of water to the face woke him from his pleasant dreams, and when he found his sight, he saw Jeyne standing over him, a now-empty bucket in hand.

"You conked yourself out on the floor," she said with distaste. "Too much drink, I imagine. Geddup, there's guests to attend to."

"Guests?" he croaked, rubbing at his face. "_What_ guests?"

Jeyne rolled her eyes and stalked off without answering him. Gendry sat up, shaking the water out of his hair, and then cursing noisily when it made his skull pound.

Pulling himself to his feet, he made his way to the next room, where the tables were crookedly assembled. The children all seemed particularly bright and jumpy today, he noticed irritably. _That means they'll be running and mucking about all day. _His eyes followed the line of children down to the end of the table where Willow was speaking to someone.

When Gendry took a few more steps, he saw the stranger's face appear where it had before been obstructed by Wat's head. _Arya Stark_.

He stopped in his tracks, blinking dumbly in between his wide-eyed stares. His heart jumped up into his throat and when he tried to swallow, he found he couldn't.

It was _her_. The same Arya he'd seen in his dream. _She_ was the guest.

She looked up at him, still saying something to Willow, and smiled a tiny smile.

The _smart_ thing would've been to turn around and go. The _smart_ thing would've been to forget she was back or even alive, to keep trying to get on without her. The _smart_ thing would've been to realise that she wasn't here to stay, that her being alive didn't change the fact that he was baseborn and she highborn, that the best thing for him to do was ignore her until she left again, as she was of course planning to do.

As he moved towards her and took a seat beside her, his heart pounding and his stomach twisting in nervous excitement, he thought that mayhaps Arya had been right when she insisted he was stupid.

_xxx_

**New chapter up soon. **


	2. They Say Indecision Makes You Weak

Gendry could only sit there, dumbly, while Willow barraged Arya with questions about her life and her travels. Arya spoke animatedly about having been in Essos, living primarily in Braavos and visiting all of the other Free Cities at least once while there. Gendry's mind buzzed and hummed—both from his drinking the night before and the realisation that Arya had been alive the whole time, but she had chosen to run away rather than come back to the Brotherhood, to _him_. He felt suddenly angry at her, thinking she must have been being a coward or utterly selfish when she made that choice.

His heart leapt when he felt her fingers begin to stroke at the back of his hand; gentle, tender. Nothing at all like Arya herself. He turned to look at her, shocked, but she was still chatting to Willow, completely unruffled and not even looking at him. Willow's eyes were huge as she asked Arya what Braavos was like, making Arya flash an easy smile.

"Well, foreign, I suppose." Gendry swallowed thickly as her fingers drew little patterns on his skin, wanting to grab her hand and just hold it, but fearing her reaction. "The language isn't so hard to learn when you're living there, though. Well—when you live there, you _have_ to learn it. The city's brilliant, too. They've got canals instead of streets."

Willow gave a longing little sigh and asked Arya if she had learnt any other languages besides Braavosi. Gendry found he could only half-listen to the conversation.

"I picked up a bit of Dothraki," Arya said with a shrug. "Some High Valyrian, Myrish, Tyroshi. Once you've got one of the Essos languages down, it isn't hard to learn the rest."

Willow smiled stupidly, looking absolutely aglow with admiration. "Well...haven't you got a family? Or a betrothed? You're very pretty, miss..."

"Arya," she supplied patiently. "No, I'm not betrothed. And I haven't seen my family in years. That's why I've come back, you see." Gendry felt a tiny stab of disappointment at that, but he did not cling to it for long. It would have been foolish to think she would cross the sea for _him_.

Willow's questions had not yet run adry, much to Gendry's impatience. He was curious about the nature of Arya's absence, too, but he was much more eager to pull her aside and talk to her himself. Especially when her soft, long fingers were stroking his like that. "Aren't you afraid of rapers and cutthroats?" Willow asked. "You're just a maid. You look to be about my age, in fact."

"She's five-and-ten," Gendry said suddenly, prompting Arya to finally turn and look at him. He stared back, trying his best to say everything he wanted to with that one look. Her eyes were wide and a bit surprised—as if she didn't expect him to remember how old she was—but her astonishment lasted only a moment before she turned back to Willow. "Yes, right. Five-and-ten. But I've never really had to worry about being overcome by men."

Gendry smiled at that, glancing sidelong to see Arya smiling, too. She gave his hand a squeeze before pulling her fingers away altogether, and he gasped softly. Looking up, he saw that Willow had not noticed it.

"Well, I s'pose it's safe to say I envy you, Miss Arya. Wish _I_ could travel all around on my own."

The children began chorusing that they had finished with their meal, and it didn't take long before they started to scatter about. Willow groaned, standing up to chase after them. Gendry turned, opening his mouth to speak to Arya, only to find her seat vacant. Brow furrowed, he looked around, spying her long braid flying behind her as she rounded the corner and left the room. He rose to follow her.

_xxx_

Arya smiled absently as she glanced around the forge, enjoying the heavy warmth that flooded the room. She looked down at a rack of various swords, morningstars and handaxes, fingering the blades and pommels with interest. She imagined Gendry beating the steel with his hammer until each weapon bended to exactly the shape he wanted it to, and she remembered when she used to watch him in the forge at Harenhall, working for hours.

"Arya!"

She whirled around, seeing Gendry climbing through the doorway and looking puzzled. His eyes fell to her hands, still on the weapons, and he frowned. "Why'd you come _here_?"

She attempted a coy smile. "I thought I should see your forge before I go. I always liked watching you smith."

Gendry licked his lips, his eyes flickering between her face and her hand. "Before you go," he echoed, his eyes reflecting a sadness that Arya didn't want to address. She spun away from him.

"Yes, eventually," she muttered. She wondered briefly why she hadn't told him that she was planning to go to Winterfell as soon as possible—the truth.

At least, that _was_ the truth, wasn't it?

"Right," Gendry said behind her, sounding flustered. "Well, I'm—I mean"—

She heard him sigh while she continued to finger the weapons, trying to appear busy and aloof.

"Arya...where've you _been_?"

She looked at him over her shoulder, smirking mirthlessly. "Braavos. Weren't you listening?"

"You know what I mean," he snapped, taking two steps towards her. "You didn't die at the Twins. You went free, clearly. You could've come _back_."

"To what?" she said coldly, turning to face him fully. "The Brotherhood only wanted to ransom me to mother, and she's _dead_."

"You could've come back," he insisted. "To me and Tom and Lem and Archer; we would've protected you!"

"I don't _need_ protection," she bit back, sweeping her eyes over him. He was stronger than before, all long muscle and tanned skin. Arya felt a quick flush of desire for him just then, and an idea occurred to her.

"Of course, if _you_ were the one protecting me," she said in her lowest voice, approaching him slowly, "mayhaps I would've reconsidered." Arya stepped close enough to him so that she could run her fingers along his collar bone, left exposed by his tunic. She was trusting that this was still the same shy Gendry she'd known as a child, the one who blushed and ran away when women flirted with him. Arya was quite desperate to avoid this conversation, for some reason.

Gendry frowned, snatching at her hand and peeling it away. "_Lady Stark_," he said firmly. She looked at him as innocently as she could manage to, inwardly wondering why he hadn't bent to her flirtation the way the boys on the ship had.

"What?" she returned, blinking.

"_Stop_," he said simply. "Just answer the question."

Arya refused to do anything but smile. "I was just afraid, that's all," she answered evenly. "Of the Hound and—well, of rapers and brigands, of course."

Gendry wasn't accepting it. "I don't believe you," he growled, taking hold of both her wrists. "You were running away from something. What was it?"

_You_, she thought, feeling sick in her stomach. She had had Gendry to rely on, up until he decided to become a knight and live with _Jeyne Heddle_. They could've been friends forever, but he'd decided to give up on her.

"Running away? Surely not," she said, letting her free hands stroke along the lines of his chest through his apron. "How could any sane girl run away from _you_?"

Gendry growled fiercely, shoving her hands away and taking a step back from her. "_Stop_ it, Arya! Stop this—this _flirting slut_ thing you're doing. It won't work!"

Arya's face went still, caught between humiliation and hurt. She straightened herself, fixing her eyes pointedly and unemotionally on his. "Fine," she whispered. "Then I'll go."

She heard Gendry call her name again as she walked away, but she did not respond.

Tom, Lem, Archer, and another man from the Brotherhood Gendry could not place came to the inn that night, badgering Jeyne and Willow as usual while making good-natured japes at Gendry. When Arya appeared at supper, Archer whistled while Tom whispered something to Lem, making him erupt with laughter. Gendry was quite certain it was crude.

Arya sat across from them and a few seats down, looking utterly unbothered as she supped. Gendry's eyes kept flickering to her as he supped in his own place next to Archer.

_They don't recognise her, _Gendry thought, seeing the way Tom winked at her and Archer watched her in the same furtive, curious way that Gendry himself did.

"Arya," Gendry called suddenly, making her head as well as Tom's, Archer's and Lem's snap up, "don't you wanna say something to your old friends from the Brotherhood?"

Her eyes widened at him, to which he only smiled. He knew it was childish and unfair for him to blow her secret like that—and a moment late he remembered that these were the men who had once wanted to ransom her—but he was still stung by her treatment of him earlier. He didn't know exactly why, but he was certain that whyever she had behaved that way, it was because she was tricking him or playing with him. And he didn't like to be treated that way; especially by Arya Stark, the girl who had never seemed to do anything but mistreat him.

Tom Sevenstrings leaned forward, his eyes bulging. "Arya _Stark_?" he whispered in nonbelief, his eyes going all around her face and body and lingering in a few places that made Gendry's fingers twitch to strike him. Tom let out a booming laugh that was both startled and pleased. "A woman grown! Last I saw you, you were just a little thing still! We had all thought you died at the Twins with"—

He paused, his next words ringing in the air. His smile died instantly, and Lem raised his eyebrows. Arya surprised Gendry by smiling patiently.

"It's alright, you can say it. With my mother and brother." She took a bite of salted pork, chewed, and swallowed before speaking again. "As it happens, letting me die was not in the Hound's interest."

"But he wanted to ransom you," Lem clarified, cocking a single eyebrow. "If he didn't want to kill you, he wanted to sell you, no?"

"Yes, that's true," Arya said. "But I managed to get away."

"From the _Hound_?" Lem said in his cool manner, sounding sceptical.

"That's our girl!" Tom said, rising from his seat to go and sit beside her. Gendry watched, nearly scoffing aloud at Tom's boldness. Woman-grown or not, this was still _Arya_, not some girl from the Peach.

"So what'd you do, knock him with the pommel of a sword? Or a rock, perhaps? How'd you manage to have him out long enough to scamper off?"

Arya's eyebrows pulled together in genuine puzzlement. Her grey eyes were hard. "'Have him out'? I thought he was _dead_."

"The 'ound?" said the man Gendry didn't know. He had heavy brows and a scruffy growth of hair along his jaw. "No. 'e was poisoned, I 'eard. Taken to a maester or summat, got it all cleared outta 'im. Now 'e's up in Winterfell."

Arya's eyebrows loosened, but her eyes froze to ice. She stared at the nameless scruffy man, her lips parted but saying nothing. Tom put a hesitant hand around her shoulder, and in spite of the tender circumstances, Gendry noticed it and was annoyed again.

"Oi, Arya," Tom said soothingly. "It's alright. He's sworn fealty to your sister."

Arya's eyes dropped. She did not look the slightest bit relieved, but nonetheless, she had planted a smile on her face again when her eyes lifted. Gendry thought that she was probably used to hearing bad news about her family by now.

"And this Bolton fool who thought he'd had me?" she said, her proud facade back in place. "Where's he run off to?"

"King Stannis had him imprisoned and executed ages ago," Lem said with a touch of pride. "House Bolton has been since destroyed. Now your sister alone rules in the North."

Gendry's heart swelled when a bright, genuine smile tore across Arya's face. Her stormy eyes were dancing for once.

"That's...wonderful."

"Let's toast," Tom said, raising his tankard. "To the Queen in the North, and her sister, returned from the dead!"

Lem and Anguy raised their own cups, as did Gendry, though reluctantly. He did not trust Tom where mead and a pretty girl were involved.

The five of them discussed politics for another half-hour or so. They talked about the Dragon Queen, biding her time in Dorne, and King Stannis' rot leg, still festering after receiving a wound there. Lem expressed terrible doubt over another Targaryen possibly taking the throne—since Stannis had no sons—while Anguy pointed out that she had already abolished slavery in much of Essos and therefore couldn't be the madman her father was. Arya's eyes were alight through the whole conversation; whether from interest or mead or both, Gendry could not say.

"You would support a woman as the ruler of the Seven Kingdoms?" Arya asked them.

"If Stannis should die—gods be good, he won't—I see little alternative," Lem said with a frown. "The girl's got dragons at her back—huge things, I hear, the size of this inn. If she chooses to invade—and I doubt she'd come to Westeros if she wasn't planning to—she could torch entire cities with a wave of her hand."

"Moreover, the Dornish _sing_ her praises," Tom said, leaning in to Arya. Gendry's fingers twitched again. "Say she's a beneficial ruler, freeing slaves and showing kindness and all. And beautiful to boot."

Arya's brow gathered. "The Targaryens are often mad, though."

Tom took another swig of his drink before dropping it clamorously to the table. "The Targaryens were incestuous, and yes, madness is a consequence often resulting from that particular sin. They aren't always that way, though. Remember Rhaegar Targaryen?"

Arya scowled. "He kidnapped my aunt Lyanna."

"Yes, that is what Robert said, but"—

"You support the Baratheons," Gendry said suddenly, and everyone turned to look at him. "Calling him a liar is treason."

Tom frowned. "I am calling him no such thing. I believe that _he_ believed she was kidnapped. But I remember the time before the rebellion, boy, and Rhaegar was a good man. I only mean to say not all Targaryens are as evil as we paint them."

Arya's face was dark. "Then you are suggesting my aunt simply ran off with him?"

Tom smiled sadly at her. "People have done much worse for love, my dear."

Arya said nothing, reaching for her tankard and finishing the last of her mead. Gendry watched her, appreciating her long, spiderlike fingers as they curled around the handle.

From there, conversation was more light-hearted. Tom spoke merrily of Brotherhood victories, significant kills and the like, and told crude stories about things which had transpired while Arya was absent. When they were all on a second tankard of mead—Gendry drank his rather gloomily and thirstily—Tom was blatantly flirting with her.

"You've grown into a lovely little thing," he told her with a subtle slur. Arya blinked up at him, her eyes dazed. Lem had gone off to speak with Jeyne about something, and Anguy was far too absorbed with his drink to pay attention to what was happening, leaving only Gendry to glower at the pair of them.

"I remember when you had boy's hair," he said, fingering the long, rich strands that had fallen in her face. "But no one could mistake you for a boy, now." Here, Tom's eyes fell plainly from her hair to her chest. Gendry kept expecting Arya to swat him away or kick him, but she only stared, a small half-smile on her face.

Tom leaned in and smelled her hair. "Ah, and you _smell_ like a woman, too."

Gendry's hand came down on the table loudly and suddenly, and the two of them broke apart to stare. Gendry glared between them, his chest heaving and his face hot with rage, before flying from his seat and striding to the door. Jeyne caught him on his way out and demanded to know where he thought he was going, and he heard himself snap something about firewood.

_xxx_

Arya waited in the forge, sitting cross-legged on Gendry's small, ragged bed. She fingered the furs absently, then felt the scratchy fabric of the mattress underneath, wondering if the material roughened his back. She had been waiting for half an hour, knowing she wanted to speak to Gendry but not daring to ask herself why.

The door opened abruptly and slapped against the wall, and Gendry saw her immediately. His eyes dragged over her sluggishly.

"...Get out. I'm going to sleep."

"Why are you behaving like this?" she asked him simply.

Gendry laughed mirthlessly, slamming the door behind him as he walked into the room. "Now _you're_ the one askin' questions? Earlier you dismissed me like some stupid boy, and now you want to play the friend again?" Gendry snorted. "I ain't lettin' you play with me twice in one day, milady. Now, if you could _absent_ yourself"—

"I'm leaving for Winterfell," she said abruptly, feeling panicked, as if the world was tightening around her. "Tomorrow. At dawn."

Gendry stilled. He stood there, staring at her, his brow drawn and his eyes hard. He looked at the floor, and she saw his hands knotting into fists at his sides. "I thought you were." When he looked back at her, he was glaring. "So you're going back to your pretty castle and your servants and your dresses. What's that got to do with me?"

Arya's chest stung as if he'd pricked her there with a knife. "I will _never_ go back to servants and dresses. I am going for my _family_. My sister is there, she _needs_ me! "

"I'll ask again: what's that got to do with _me_?" Gendry snapped back at her immediately, advancing on her. "Why'd you stop here if your plan all along was to leave again?"

Arya swallowed back the answer that was standing and glaring a few feet away from her. "I had to rest. My horse"—

Gendry interrupted her with a rude scoff. "It looks like you haven't changed one bit, milady. Still as much of a liar and a pretender as little Arry was."

Arya jumped from the bed and stalked to him, the mead making her brash and angry. "Call me a liar again, bastard boy. _Do_ it."

"I wouldn't need to if you told the truth, _Lady Stark."_

Arya could have slapped him for that alone; but now his eyes weren't as hard. Now they were searching, imploring. Now he was licking his lips anxiously, and she _couldn't_ lie to him, not now, not when he was so _close_.

"Alright," she blurted, frustrated, "I wanted to see you, idiot. But clearly that was a mistake, since you've done nothing but behave like your stupid self."

Gendry's eyes went soft at once. He licked his lips again, and Arya was ashamed when she was struck with the sudden desire to kiss him. She had always thought he was handsome, even as a child, but she _couldn't_ kiss him. This was _Gendry_.

"Come with me," she whispered, unbidden. She thought for a moment to recall the words, but she couldn't. She _did_ want him to come with her. She wondered if, secretly, this was what she had wanted all along. "My sister will have need of a good smith. You'll be well paid, and you can live in the castle." Arya paused for a beat. "With me," she tacked on as an afterthought.

Gendry's eyes swam with a thousand and one emotions. He kept shifting and opening his mouth to say something before shutting it again. Arya squirmed, feeling anxious and afraid all of a sudden.

"I can't," he said quietly, and his gaze was full of regret. Arya's heart dropped. "I have a place here. I have to help Jeyne with the orphans, and"—

Arya fist shot out and she punched him hard in the shoulder. He staggered a bit before looking up to give her a wide, incredulous stare, his unhurt side rubbing at his wounded shoulder. "_Gods_! What in hell was _that_ for?"

Arya's lip quivered with humiliation. "Piss off, you stupid baseborn! You'd probably burn the castle down anyway, like the idiot you are!" She hadn't shouted like this since she was one-and-ten, back when she and Gendry were together with the Brotherhood. Back when he'd gotten himself knighted and come to apologise for leaving her.

She fled the room before he could call her back.

_xxx_

Her courser tossed and brayed while she saddled him, tying burlap sacks of food to the empty loops. Frost crunched on the grass beneath her feet and cold, stinging air bit at her nose and cheeks and weathered her lips, but she ignored it.

Arya climbed into the saddle, Needle slung over on one hip, and had her leg poised to rouse her horse when the call of "milady!" stilled her.

Whipping her head around, she saw Gendry running towards her, a rucksack bouncing at his back.

Arya could not fight a grin when he reached her, smiling boyishly.

"What are you doing?" she asked, her stomach flipping wildly.

Gendry was breathless when he answered, "Well, I'd be a piss-poor knight if I let a highborn lady travel alone all the way to Winterfell, wouldn't I?" Then he'd flashed her a smile full of bright teeth.

"What about the orphans?"

"Willow said she'll take my place. I can't stay here forever." He did his anxious lip-lick again. "Is your offer still good?"

Arya pretended to contemplate it. "Well, I _suppose_ so." She raised a conditional finger. "But you'll sit _behind_ me in the saddle. The reigns are mine."


End file.
